


Unguarded

by oshare_banchou



Series: I Make My Own Luck [6]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Drama, Humor, M/M, Pancakes, Romance, Saoirse Hawke, Trust
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-21
Updated: 2014-03-21
Packaged: 2018-01-16 10:54:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1344826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oshare_banchou/pseuds/oshare_banchou
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A punch is thrown, pancakes are pondered, and someone has a confession to make. Just a typical morning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unguarded

**Author's Note:**

> For the purposes of this fic, I'm taking Lady Hawke's MotA dialogue about pancakes as evidence that this delectable breakfast food does indeed exist in Thedas. However, not a word shall be spoken about the related but considerably more gruesome dwarven delicacy: nug pancakes.

     “What is it, Hawke?”

     “…hm? What is what?” Hawke mumbles sleepily, his voice muffled in Fenris’s pillow. He exaggerates a yawn, stretching his arms above his head to disguise the fact that he is glancing sidelong at Fenris to gauge his expression.

     Fenris props himself up on his elbows, acutely aware of the way the motion causes the bed sheets to slither down his back and settle indecently low on his waist. He resists the urge to readjust them. “You have been… _looking_ at me ever since you awoke.”

     “Have I really?” Hawke rolls onto his back and clasps his hands behind his head. He would have looked the very picture of easy nonchalance—were it not for the guilty smile Fenris catches playing at the corner of his lips.

     “No, I think you must have me confused with someone else. Maybe that creepy statuette on the mantel that’s been eyeing us all night.” Hawke shudders and glances furtively at the statuette in question. “It’s still watching,” he whispers. “Maker knows the kind of dirt it has on us now! Ten to one it was watching when it did it up against the—”

     Fenris claps a hand over Hawke’s mouth not a moment too soon, the barest hint of a blush coloring his cheeks and working its way toward the tips of his ears. “Don’t change the subject, Hawke,” he counters, with as stern a glare as he can muster on a lazy weekend morning.

     Duly rebuffed, Hawke crosses his heart in wordless apology, as if demonstrate that he has reflected on his actions. Nevertheless, Fenris can feel the man’s roguish grin tickling the palm of his hand; and when he finally eases his fingers away from Hawke’s mouth, he regrets it almost instantly.

     “—did it up against the _open_ window. That was kinky. What _will_ your neighbors think?”

     The words have barely left his mouth before Fenris clocks him in the jaw. He doesn’t use his full strength, but the punch is far from a love tap. Hawke curls in on himself, tangled in the sheets and clutching his jaw, and waits for the psychedelic parade of chirping baby dragons to fade from his field of vision.

     “… _damn_ , that hurt,” Hawke swears. “Alright, I suppose I deserved that—”

     “You most certainly did,” Fenris corrects.

     “—much obliged, then. But in my defense, the window business was originally _your_ idea. And in the interest of full disclosure: I think you may have fractured my jaw. _Ow_.”

     Listening to Hawke grouse as he nurses his new injury culls a huff of a laugh from Fenris.

     “I’m glad you find my misery so amusing,” Hawke mutters.

     Fenris studies Hawke from beneath a fringe of sleep-mussed bangs. “Not ‘amusing’, per se. But there is something incredibly… _satisfying_ about seeing justice served.”

     Hawke nods begrudgingly, still rubbing his jaw. “I can respect that. Still, I’d appreciate a little warning next time you feel the urge to play vigilante.”

     “That would defeat the purpose,” Fenris retorts, sparing another chuckle at Hawke’s expense.

     “…very true. Besides, if playing vigilante is off the table, then we’re practically out of a job.”

     There is a great rustling of sheets and blankets as Hawke sits up, suddenly fully awake and alert. “Speaking of _purpose_ , I think we’d be remiss in our duties if we didn’t take advantage of this rare opportunity to indulge in a leisurely breakfast—or any breakfast at all, for that matter. I’m thinking pancakes. What say you?” he asks, with a tilt of his head and a lopsided grin that Fenris would have found damn near irresistible, were it not for the fact that Hawke is blatantly dodging Fenris's initial question.

     “Hawke, tell me why.” This time, Fenris phrases it as a demand, _not_ a question—a sure sign that his patience is on the ropes.

     But Hawke makes a living flirting with danger. Throwing caution to the wind, he decides to push his luck a little farther. “Why I want pancakes?” he replies, throwing in a double take for good measure. “What’s not to like about layer upon layer of syrupy, fattening goodness?

     “Plus, I think we’ve still got some of those elderberries Merrill gave us. Those would make a delicious syrup, don’t you think?” Hawke chatters absently, now fully occupied with the monstrous task of untangling himself from the sheets and climbing over Fenris and out of bed.

     Hawke plants one bare foot on the cold tile floor, but that’s the full extent of the progress he makes before Fenris grabs his wrist, yanking him backward. Hawke crashes to the mattress with a mighty _whump_ that leaves him disoriented but laughing breathlessly.

     “Fenris, what in Maker’s name…?”

     The laughter stops abruptly, however, when he looks up to see Fenris looming above him, pinning him in place. Perhaps it was simply a trick of the grey light of a dawn yet waking, but Hawke would bet good coin that there, for the breadth of a single instant, he sees a look of unguarded fragility lurking in the shadows of Fenris’s eyes.

     Hawke blinks, and the look is gone—but that uncertain glimpse is enough to sober him, to force him to come to terms with the reason why Fenris is so adamant about chasing down this mystery. It’s also enough to set demonic butterflies flouncing about in his stomach at the thought of exactly what he needs to say.

     “I must know _why_ ,” Fenris repeats. Four words, just four short syllables, but they tremble with the weight of a life newly freed from its chains, of hope and fear found in equal measure as Fenris and Hawke stare in the face of a future neither one of them had ever expected to have.

     Hawke swallows thickly and looks away for a moment, to gather his thoughts. It’s a heady subject to breach first thing in the morning, especially considering that they’re lying in bed, the sheets in utter disarray around them, with not a stitch of clothing on their bodies, and Hawke’s mind insists on straying to more productive, less mortifying ways they could be spending their time, such as giving last night’s acrobatics a run for their money with an encore performance.

     Or making innocent, elderberry pancakes.

     Or battling dragons. At least _dragons_ didn't ask questions. They just stomped about, breathing fire and spitting venom and bursting eardrums with their banshee-like screeches. Them, Hawke could handle. _This…now this is different. In a mind-numbingly terrifying sort of way._

     Finally, with a sigh and a gratuitous roll of his eyes, Hawke grumbles, “You’re going to make me _say_ it, aren’t you? Bloody bastard.”

     Fenris’s expression darkens suddenly, like a summer squall whipping up over the Waking Sea, and his grip on Hawke’s shoulders tightens like a vise. He starts to speak, but Hawke interrupts with a finger pressed lightly to Fenris’s lips.

     “Fear not; that was a rhetorical question.”

     Slowly, Fenris shakes his head in exasperation, unable to conceal the knowing glint in his eyes. “One of these days, a ‘rhetorical question’ is going to be the death of you.”

     “Perhaps,” Hawke admits, smiling fondly to shutter the nerves. “But if I know you, you won’t let me bleed out until you've had your answer.”

     Fenris obligingly relaxes his grip, if only marginally. “Let’s hear it, then.” It’s only in that moment that Hawke realizes Fenris’s hands are trembling.

     “If you insist.” Hawke can only pray that the sound of his voice is loud enough to drown out the resounding echo of his heartbeat, as his heart has apparently resolved to pound its way clean out of his chest. But he steadies himself, delving deep for courage as if preparing to rush headlong into battle, and looks Fenris square in the eyes.

     “I am yours, just as you are mine. I was ‘looking’ at you, as you put it, because I love everything about you—I love the reasons you left, and the reasons you came home. I love the way you’ve come to smile more often, and the way you always have my back. I love the way you savor every last drop of a fine wine, and the way you’re oblivious to the fact that you have a tell at Wicked Grace.”

     Fenris opens his mouth to object, but Hawke plows ahead, in far too deep to stop now.

     “I love all those things, and everything, _everything_ else you are,” he continues. “And I count myself the luckiest man on this Maker-forsaken continent for having the chance to spend the rest of my life with you. I love you, Fenris, and may the Blight take you if you dare ask me to repeat any of that. And if you don’t believe me, you can _mmmph_ —!”

     Fortunately, Hawke’s final words are lost in a kiss, because Fenris is pressed flush against him now, their limbs entwined and the chilly morning air raising goosebumps on their skin and the bed creaking in protest beneath them. Hawke’s fingers anchor in Fenris’s disheveled hair, and Fenris’s thumbs can’t stop tracing the line of Hawke’s jaw, soothing over the swollen skin where his fist had connected. Something about the sensation on his fingertips makes Fenris sigh into the kiss, and Hawke reckons that bittersweet sound alone could be his undoing.

     When they finally part, lips red and breath ragged, Hawke’s trademark goofy grin is firmly in place. “Good answer?” he asks.

     “Good answer,” Fenris replies, interlocking his fingers with Hawke’s.

     Hawke looks skyward, past Fenris, and gestures toward the ceiling. “Before I forget, I feel obligated to mention that there is a rather sizeable hole in the roof. Damn, I thought we’d patched that one. Bloody possessed pigeons must be at it again.”

     Nonplussed, Fenris follows Hawke’s gaze and cranes his neck to look up at the ceiling of the mansion. He wonders why they hadn’t noticed a draft the night before—but, of course, there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this phenomenon: There _isn’t_ a hole in the roof at all.

     Still, while Fenris is momentarily distracted, Hawke makes his move and uses his grip on Fenris’s hands as leverage to heave himself off the bed. Fenris grunts, startled, as he is flipped onto his back, and just like that, their positions are reversed. Hawke looks inordinately pleased with his accomplishment, and as he beams down at Fenris, he whispers, “I think the pancakes can wait.”


End file.
